What are the advantages and disadvantages of storing dates as integers in a MySQL database in PHP applications?

Storing dates as integers in a MySQL database in PHP applications can be advantageous in terms of storage space and performance, as integers take up less space and are faster to compare than date data types. However, it can be more difficult to work with dates in integer form, as they need to be converted back and forth between human-readable formats. Additionally, there may be limitations in terms of date range and precision when using integers to represent dates. 

// Storing dates as integers in a MySQL database
$date = strtotime('2022-12-31'); // Convert date to timestamp
$timestamp = date('Y-m-d', $date); // Convert timestamp back to date format for display or manipulation
$query = "INSERT INTO table_name (date_column) VALUES ($date)";
// Execute query and handle errors

Keywords

MySQL database PHP dates integers

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